Tuesday, April 21, 2020

Years ago when I lived in The Netherlands, I would regularly visit P.W. Akkerman in The Hague, in the historical Passage. It's a beautiful place and the store itself is truly to-die-for! I loved going there and it's one of the things I loved the most and miss the most about living there. In a time (two times, actually) of obviously questionable financial decisions, I ended up with two Pelikan Souverän M1000 Raden fountain pens - the Sunlight and the Sunrise. I didn't need either. The M1000 is a large pen and I already had one anyway, and it's such a big pen in my hand that I don't use them for long writing sessions. I don't post them, but I still find them comfortable enough for a little while. And they have killer nibs that are irresistible, so for that alone, having an M1000 is worth it. I have an old-style BB, a BBB, and an O3B.

The Sunlight has a black base with thin blue-purple-green abalone strips and the Sunrise has a crimson red base with wider green-pink strips. They show fingerprints pretty easily because they're so glossy, so they do require regular wiping with a soft cloth. I'm okay with that. I don't really carry these pens around too often. Since they wear such broad, special nibs, they are reserved for all my fun writing - hand lettering, quotes, testing inks, and other super fun pizzazzy writing. As I said, the M1000 is a large pen so I don't post them and I don't use them for lots and lots of writing - I wouldn't write a super long letter to a pen pal, but I do manage well enough. The writing experience of the M1000 nib is totally different to the rest of the Souveräns so it's worth the extra effort to me.

In case you were wondering, the M1000 nibs are not flexible nibs. They are large, soft, nibs that can be sprung easily, so don't expect them to be flexible and bounce back. They're not meant for that. A very light touch is all you should need and if it's over polished and hard starting, hand it over to a nibmeister to fix up for you.

They are not inexpensive pens. Shall I tell you a disturbing story? I once dropped the Sunrise piston-down on a concrete floor. It was horrific. I was so lucky that the only damage was to the piston turning knob which got dinged up. The rest of the pen was miraculously unscathed. The piston was then swapped out by a friend for their M1000 piston so that mine would be undamaged.

My Sunrise has now gone on to live with a good friend but I still have the Sunlight, the original one I purchased. I like that the Sunrise lives close to me so I can still see if I feel the need. Guess who it went to live with? The same person who swapped out the piston for me from their pen! Realistically, I was able to convince myself I didn't need two of them.

Pelikan has now released the new version of the M1000 Raden series - the Green Ray. It's really pretty with its black base and wide, green strips. Tempting...but I shall keep my cool and stick to fantasizing about it.

Raden is a traditional Japanese decorative craft. Working with small pieces of precious shell material, the master artist creates a unique and distinctive striped fountain pen which is an impressive piece of art. Our latest limited edition Souverän® M1000 Raden enchants through the fascinating wide green colored mother of pearl stripes on the surface. The stripes on the fountain pen glisten and shimmer in the sunlight, that creates a fascinating interplay of colors in green, blue and purple hues.

The first step to create the fountain pen is to give the surface a deep black impression by using the special Japanese Urushi lacquer. Then the traditional stripes are made with particles from Australian abalone. In the next step the mother of pearl of stripes are fixed to the cap and barrel by coating of lacquer. Finally, the artist individually signs and numbers each fountain pen with the Maki-e technique.

Each individually produced piece is crafted by hand and truly unique. The Souverän® M1000 Green Ray will be available as from March 2020 in a limited edition of 400 pieces worldwide.